Doesn’t Matter Who Wins the K Race; We’re All the Same

[Pretty Little Flower]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

If you don't see the ironic use of "pilates instructor" or "hairdresser," I'd advocate some DMT. See the mechanical elves... let them carry you away from angry-and-righteous-pants land.

[ThurgreedMarshall]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

I can not watch Maher. In fact, I can cancel HBO. I just can't tie the two, or threaten the second if they don't take Maher off. I got all that, and since I don't want to be low, I will behave accordingly.

My fear though, is what if an HBO rep calls me and asks why I cancelled?

Dude, you already fucked up by telling us you're going to cancel HBO. I'm going to do it too now, which makes you the head of a boycott mob.

TM

[ThurgreedMarshall]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

An angry reaction by a number of people which gets the attention of HBO execs and causes them to fire Maher is fine. That's an organic process ending in a business decision. An angry reaction by a number of people demanding that Maher lose his job and pushing for that result is not within the marketplace of ideas. It's not a response to an idea at all. I'll explain by example:

Maher made a dumb racially insensitive joke a few months ago.

In response, normal people said, "That was a foul. Bad joke, bad idea. Bad Bill. Don't do something like that again." Other normal people, like Ice Cube, came on his show and took him to the woodshed about his bad judgment in making the joke.

That is the marketplace of ideas at work. Maher offered an idea -- that it was okay for him to make that joke, and that the joke was funny. The marketplace said, "Nope, Bill. That joke is not okay. It sucks and it's offensive. Bad fucking idea."

Bill lost. If his idea, or his joke, were a company, it'd have failed. If it were a stock, it'd have gone to zero. And consequently, everyone learned a lesson about boundaries. And Maher, whose program showcases important issues and important guests (climate change almost every week, to name one of many) remains a source of useful and enlightening entertainment (for a TV crowd).

But... If the Twitter mob had its way, much as dipshit right wingers threw Maher off of HBO in 2001 for telling the truth (that the 9/11 hijackers were not cowards by any stretch of the imagination), Maher and his show would have ended. This is not a competition of ideas. This is retribution. It's childish anger -- and it's the low seeking to take down their betters. It's a bully with a Twitter feed seeking to preclude the competition of Maher's dumb joke and the public's view of it within the marketplace of ideas. It's seeking to attack not the idea, but the source of it. It's also weak. It suggests that the idea might not fail or be sufficiently rejected on its own.

I find many opinions and ideas repugnant and stupid and offensive. But should I seek to silence their speakers in reply to them? Or should I seek to express why and how such views are flawed and stupid and offensive? Clearly, for the thinking person, the smart and evolved person, the latter is the preferred course. (It's not even up for debate.)

If you say something I don't like, I've the right to tell your boss to fire you for it. But I would hope, and I trust this would be the case, that your boss would say, "Fuck you" to me in response. But as you correctly note, if the mob gets large enough and loud enough, in many instances, a board will fire the offending comic or pundit regardless of whether the mob has asked for that redress. That's unfortunate. But I don't blame the mob for that. Should the mob demand the offender be fired, however, fuck that mob. Fuck that deeply un-American mob and its childish, thuggish behavior. And yes, they are low. He who defies the spirit of free speech in that regard - and that defies it - is low.

I really do not think you understand that you are personally deciding where the you-should-get-fired line is. You don't think that particular joke rises to the level of a fire-able offense. Obviously there are awful, terrible jokes that would (in your mind). I'm not going to give you an example because I assume you're smart enough to understand the point I'm making.

But even with your example, HBO engaged in an analysis based on the number of people who took offense to what Maher said. I guarantee you that if there were significantly more people who thought that the joke was so offensive that he should have lost his job, he would have lost his job. Period.

I think we can agree that there are instances when people get carried away. I don't agree that shouting down speakers who have been invited to share their ideas (even if they're awful) makes sense. It (kinda) happened at my alma mater to a guy who was a former white supremacist who was invited to talk about the mindset of white supremacists and what made him change (as well as his work fighting against hate). He was allowed to speak, but students held protest signs during the entire talk because they didn't want the school rewarding him or some shit.

On campuses, the issue is that a small group of people has an outsized voice and can ruin it for a large group of people. I think you're conflating that with your constant "twitter mob" references. The two things do not work the same way. If someone says something truly offensive, I guarantee you networks, shows, advertisers (i) make a determination whether they want to be associated with someone like that and/or (ii) perform an analysis of how many people are expressing anger and whether the threat of the loss of their business is worth a continued association. What amazes me is that you do not think that all of that falls within the marketplace of ideas.

Having a TV show is great. It is a tremendously rewarding job in terms of fame and fortune. You are not guaranteed a right to keep it. You either figure out how to maintain it or you don't. I see no difference between being completely unfunny such that you lose your show over lack of interest or being so offensive that you lose your show over outrage. The fact that you are so worked up about the very few instances of people dealing with the consequences of their own words and inability to understand how not to be overly offensive is absolutely puzzling.

TM

[Adder]

So, the President was accused of rape (again) and it's sorta not a thing. That's depressing.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by ThurgreedMarshall

Dude, you already fucked up by telling us you're going to cancel HBO. I'm going to do it too now, which makes you the head of a boycott mob.

TM

I’m the top of the low? Deal!!!

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Adder

So, the President was accused of rape (again) and it's sorta not a thing. That's depressing.

Kavanaugh/Avenatti Effect.

Fire at the bear, kill it. Otherwise...

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Kavanaugh/Avenatti Effect.

Fire at the bear, kill it. Otherwise...

https://www.google.com/amp/freewilli...last-night/amp

Sort of on point- Brooklyn Bazaar, which is a midsize (900) venue, rented the space to someone putting on a show. The promoter/renter booked Louis CK, without advertising the fact (a festival). Louis came out and the crowd reacted, surprised, happy maybe? 900 people; some had to be pissed?

BK small press not happy. The venue distanced itself really quickly.

Is it weird that a venue had to worry about being seen as a place that would book him? Louis and his bad acts hit members of the NYC comedy/improv community so maybe it’s understandable?

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

https://www.google.com/amp/freewilli...last-night/amp

Sort of on point- Brooklyn Bazaar, which is a midsize (900) venue, rented the space to someone putting on a show. The promoter/renter booked Louis CK, without advertising the fact (a festival). Louis came out and the crowd reacted, surprised, happy maybe? 900 people; some had to be pissed?

BK small press not happy. The venue distanced itself really quickly.

Is it weird that a venue had to worry about being seen as a place that would book him? Louis and his bad acts hit members of the NYC comedy/improv community so maybe it’s understandable?

Sounds like the venue had its cake and ate it too. They got a happy crowd and covered their ass by apologizing to any folks who might be pissed. Good way to play it. Free press, all good.

There’s a seriously demented vindictiveness at work in society at the moment. It’s not enough to win the debate anymore. It’s not enough for proportional punishment to be meted out. There must be blood. Someone must lose a job, be “locked up,” etc.. My pet theory is it’s politics seeping into our psyches. I blame Newt Gingrich. It wasn’t enough to beat Clinton in political chess. He decided to try to destroy the guy. The “resistance” to Bush II did the same, and McConnell enabled the GOP in doing it to Obama. Trump did it to Hillary, and the resistance to Trump is doing it to him.

Morons learn from seeing this crap on TV that “total war” is the best way to approach those with whom you disagree. That punishment must be extreme, that we must be not only tough but draconian, if not medieval, on crime. And social media has allowed everyone’s ugly Id to run amuck.

It’s a fucking dumpster fire. Moral panics in every direction. Whiners and victims on all sides. (The right has embraced “victim fetishization” with gusto.)

Nobody is “decent” anymore, to borrow that term as used by Morgan Freeman in his speech from the bench at the end of movie version of Bonfire of the Vanities.

CK deserved some time in exile. He got it. I understand some people finding him odious. I can’t look at him the same again. But he’s really fucking funny. So on balance, a press freak out over his appearance is something unwarranted, and something most of us won’t read. Apparently, the crowd who cheered for him agrees.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

I’m the top of the low? Deal!!!

Apropos of nothing, I think the Low album is Bowie's most underrated.

[ThurgreedMarshall]

McConnell, acting through the Supreme Court, has just destroyed democracy.

TM

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by ThurgreedMarshall

McConnell, acting through the Supreme Court, has just destroyed democracy.

TM

Not necessarily. Look to the state constitution instead: https://www.inquirer.com/philly/news...-20180207.html

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Not necessarily. Look to the state constitution instead: https://www.inquirer.com/philly/news...-20180207.html

Or take the power from the legislature https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.fre...amp/1847078002

[ThurgreedMarshall]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Not necessarily. Look to the state constitution instead: https://www.inquirer.com/philly/news...-20180207.html

You're insane. You think Texas (and every single Republican state) isn't going to immediately gerrymander the fuck out of themselves with computer programs and algorithms to make sure they never ever turn blue? These state decisions will be few and far between.

This country is being fucked in the ass dry. And Republicans are doing the fucking.

TM

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by ThurgreedMarshall

You're insane. You think Texas (and every single Republican state) isn't going to immediately gerrymander the fuck out of themselves with computer programs and algorithms to make sure they never ever turn blue? These state decisions will be few and far between.

This country is being fucked in the ass dry. And Republicans are doing the fucking.

TM

If the state constitution has a free and equal voting clause like PA’s, a state Supreme Court would be hard pressed not to do as PA’s did. And PA is insanely corrupt (house and senate controlled by GOP, btw) and its courts very political.

You’ll win some, you’ll lose some. But SCOTUS is not the final word here in every state. This just perhaps delays the purpling of TX.

[ThurgreedMarshall]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

If the state constitution has a free and equal voting clause like PA’s, a state Supreme Court would be hard pressed not to do as PA’s did. And PA is insanely corrupt, and its courts very political.

You’ll win some, you’ll lose some. But SCOTUS is not the final word here in every state.

I think you're delusional.

TM